Forgiveness

If I said that forgiveness is hard, I bet everyone would agree with me. Forgiveness isn’t something that we should take lightly either. It is an important factor in our walk in Christian faith. When the Moravian missionaries first went to the Eskimos, they could not find a word in their language for forgiveness, so they had to compound one. It turned out to be the word Issumagijoujungnainermik. It is a horribly formidable looking assembly of letters. To you and me, it looks like gibberish. But it is actually an expression that has a beautiful connotation for those who understand it. It means: “Not-being-able-to-think-about-it-anymore.” Forgiveness even in our language doesn’t do enough justice to the action that it requires. It can be the hardest thing for us to do. Today we are going to tackle this subject. Matthew 18:21-35 is our Scripture for this morning. Turn there, and we will read. "21 Then Peter came to Him and said, "Lord, how many times could my brother sin against me and I forgive him? As many as seven times?" 22 "I tell you, not as many as seven," Jesus said to him, "but 70 times seven. 23 For this reason, the kingdom of heaven can be compared to a king who wanted to settle accounts with his slaves. 24 When he began to settle accounts, one who owed 10,000 talents was brought before him. 25 Since he had no way to pay it back, his master commanded that he, his wife, his children, and everything he had be sold to pay the debt. 26 "At this, the slave fell facedown before him and said, 'Be patient with me, and I will pay you everything!' 27 Then the master of that slave had compassion, released him, and forgave him the loan. 28 "But that slave went out and found one of his fellow slaves who owed him 100 denarii. He grabbed him, started choking him, and said, 'Pay what you owe!' 29 "At this, his fellow slave fell down and began begging him, 'Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.' 30 But he wasn't willing. On the contrary, he went and threw him into prison until he could pay what was owed. 31 When the other slaves saw what had taken place, they were deeply distressed and went and reported to their master everything that had happened. 32 "Then, after he had summoned him, his master said to him, 'You wicked slave! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. 33 Shouldn't you also have had mercy on your fellow slave, as I had mercy on you? ' 34 And his master got angry and handed him over to the jailers until he could pay everything that was owed. 35 So My heavenly Father will also do to you if each of you does not forgive his brother from his heart." A few weeks ago, we talked about church discipline. If you remember right, it was the Scripture that was just prior to this one we’re reading today. We talked about the procedure we should take if someone is committing a sin. Moreover, we talked about how important it is that we do not hate them, but love on them if we have to ‘treat them like a pagan’. With this in mind, we pick up our Scripture today with Peter asking how many times we should forgive our brother. Peter is asking this because the Jewish law, the man-made laws that the Pharisees came up with, say that we should forgive our brother 3 times. Having lived with this law, I am sure Peter was a little confused to say the least. So, expanding on what was custom as the 3 times, Peter mentions this time, 7. However, Jesus has something much bigger in mind. 70 x 7. The answer to that is 490 times. Yet, 490 isn’t exactly what Jesus is getting at. He isn’t saying that on the 491st time it’s ok to not forgive them. What he’s saying is that you aren’t really going to keep track of that many times. Even if you do, you’d lose track about the 3rd or 4th time. The point is, that we should forgive an infinite number of times. What follows this is a parable. This parable Jesus tells is one that can make a huge impact if we understand it. Jesus tells of this slave who is summoned by the king to pay his debt. This slave owes the king 10,000 talents. First of all, we have to understand that 1 talent is around 6,000 denarii. A denarius was the Roman currency. It is thought to be worth about 16 cents or so. It is thought that a talent is a measure of gold, around 70 pounds. In today’s terms, this slave owed millions of dollars to a king. This amount is impossible to be repaid by a slave. There is no way he would ever be able to repay this debt. Yet, the king commanded that his wife, children and everything he owned be sold to make up for at least some of the money owed. The slave threw himself on the floor and begged the king to be patient; that he would pay back what he owed. The king had mercy on him and thus forgave the debt owed to him, relieving him of the burden of it. However, this slave went out and found a fellow slave that owed him 100 denarii. Keep in mind that 1 denarius is about 16 cents. We’re talking about $1600 compared to several million here. Yet, the first slave was unwilling to work with the second slave, and threw him in prison until he could repay the debt. The other slaves heard about this and subsequently went to the master, the king. They told him what the first slave was doing, and the king went to the slave and told him that since he forgave his debt, then he should have done the same thing to his fellow slave. The king threw the first slave in prison until he could repay the debt. That slave is going to be in prison forever…the debt is already unpayable…1600 compared to several million is a huge difference. It would have been easier to forgive the small debt like the big one had been. Now that we understand the monetary info and background, this is what Jesus is saying about forgiveness. The king represents God. The slaves are you and I, the money we owe is our sin, and the prison is hell. God, the king, is looking to settle things with us. We all owe God a debt bigger than we can ever pay. He sent his son to die for our sins. There is nothing we can ever do to repay that kind of debt. Yet, we go out and when someone sins against us, we choke them forcing them to repay us what they owe us. Whether literal money or repayment for a sin against us, we demand that they pay for what they’ve done. However, when God sees that we, who have been forgiven a debt larger than what we can pay back, are not willing to forgive a sin against us that amount to a very little compared to what we’ve been forgiven, God questions us by saying, shouldn’t you give the same forgiveness you’ve been given? If we continue on in our unforgiving nature, God will not forgive you if you do not forgive your brothers of their sins. Not only do we need to say the words, but we need to feel the forgiveness from our hearts. If we go through life holding the grudges-like we talked about last week, it will eat us alive. If we do this, not forgiving our brothers and sisters, it will act like a poison inside of us. It can literally give you a stomach ache, pain, and a general feeling of being unwell. Many people have physical pains because of not being able to forgive others. Gordon MacDonald tells this story: “One memory that burns deep within is that of a plane flight on which I was headed toward a meeting that would determine a major decision in my ministry. I knew I was in desperate need of a spiritual passion that would provide wisdom and submission to God’s purposes. But the passion was missing because I was steeped in resentment toward a colleague. For days I had tried everything to rid myself of vindictive thoughts toward that person. But try as I might, I would even wake in the night thinking of ways to subtly get back at him. I wanted to embarrass him for what he had done, to damage his credibility before his peers. My resentment was beginning to dominate me and on that plane trip I came to a realization of how bad things really were… As the plane entered the landing pattern I found myself crying silently to God for power both to forgive and to experience liberation from my poisoned spirit. Suddenly it was as if an invisible knife cut a hole in my chest, and I literally felt a thick substance oozing from within. Moments later I felt as if I’d been flushed out. I’d lost negative spiritual weight, the kind I needed to lose; I was free. I fairly bounced off that plane and soon entered a meeting that did in fact change the entire direction of my life. My friends, an unforgiving spirit can literally poison you. Don’t harbor resentment toward anyone or anything that has caused you wrong. A good place to start is by praying for God to show you the people that need to be forgiven. Pray that God give you the capacity and the power to forgive where it needs to be had. Whether that forgiveness needs to be demonstrated to issues within the church in the past, to a family member, or even to a someone you’ve met in passing; forgive others of their debts if you want to be forgiven yours. God does to us as we do to those around us.